


all of your love is sunlight

by aletterinthenameofsanity



Series: their smiles shaped wrong [1]
Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Power Rangers, Power Rangers Samurai
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hunger Games Setting, Careers (Hunger Games), District 2, Gay Male Character, Jayden and Lauren are victors, Jayden and Lauren win back-to-back games, M/M, Sibling Bonding, also Antonio's a Victor, as Careers, but not from Two, fire metaphors
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-23
Updated: 2019-07-23
Packaged: 2020-07-12 09:14:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19943731
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aletterinthenameofsanity/pseuds/aletterinthenameofsanity
Summary: Lauren had done it first. She’d won a Games set in an arid desert, won by her swordplay and knowledge of fire, which had kept her alive during the plunging temperatures at night.And Jayden, the next year- he’d come out of the Arena, too, despite the fact that they all expected him to die.Oh, it’s not that big of an assumption to make. Lauren won the Sixty Eighth Games and no District’s ever taken home back-to-back wins before. Jayden getting chosen by Ji, the Victor of Thirty Second Games, should have been a death knell. It should have spelled Jayden’s violent death in the Arena.But, against all expectations, it wasn’t. Jayden had gone into the Arena with Serena at his side, and he’d come out the Victor. Seven children had died at his hands and his blade, but he’d still survived, emerging to the President’s crown on his head and his sister’s congratulations.(Jayden Shiba wins the Hunger Games and somehow manages to get closer to his sister and fall in love with a boy from Three. Kind of. It's a trip.)





	all of your love is sunlight

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lorata](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lorata/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Fixed to a Star](https://archiveofourown.org/works/655081) by [lorata](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lorata/pseuds/lorata). 



> Title is from "Sunlight" by Hozier.
> 
> Alright, so this is the first in a series of Power Rangers in Panem AU. I've pretty much planned out the last thirty years of Games leading up to the Third Quarter Quell, planned out which teams end up in which Districts, what relationships I'm using, who dies and who lives, and how the rebellion functions. It's going to be quite the journey.
> 
> Also, once again, the District Two training system is directly inspired by the one lorata wrote/developed in "Tales of District Two," so it just feels right that I gift this to her.

_ And you know what you once told me,  _

_ about how people’s eyes have something honest about them when they’re watching a fire. _

**-Haruki Murakami**

All of Panem expects Jayden to be just like his older sister. They’ve got most of that down, already- the same blond hair, the same light blue eyes, the same deadly aim with a sword that led them to win the Hunger Games two years in a row-

Jayden doesn’t swallow as President Snow presses the crown onto his blond hair, doesn’t search out his sister in the audience. He doesn’t try to find Lauren, quiet and serious, dressed to the nines in a red gown that matches the suit their stylist dressed him in today. He doesn’t try to find Ji, his Mentor for the Games, doesn’t try to seek out Lauren and his long-dead father, the one who would probably have mentored them both through the Games if it hadn’t been for his death years ago.

Instead, he just thinks about the weight of expectations that are pressing down on his shoulders just as surely as the Victor’s crown is.

All his life, people have compared him and his sister. They’ve talked about him following in Lauren’s footsteps, bringing as much honor and glory to the District as she did.

Lauren had done it first, of course, come out the Victor daughter of Alan Shiba, who’d won the Games over twenty years ago. She’d won a Games set in an arid desert, won by her swordplay and knowledge of fire, which had kept her alive during the plunging temperatures at night.

Jayden remembers her Victory Tour, just last year, which had ended in Two with her and her Mentor, Haruhi, standing at the train platform with a speech for their District. She’d worn a red wrap dress in a variant of the traditional Two style and she’d been practically glowing with health and Victory. Everyone had celebrated the woman who’d Volunteered to take the spot of a little blonde girl who’d actually been the little sister of Serena, a girl in Jayden’s year, and in turn Lauren had smiled and played the part of the gracious Victor, no matter how much she may have dreamed in blood.

And Jayden, the next year- he’d come out of the Arena, too, despite the fact that they all expected him to die.

Oh, it’s not that big of an assumption to make. Lauren won the Sixty Eighth Games and no District’s ever taken home back-to-back wins before. Jayden getting chosen by Ji, the Victor of Thirty Second Games, should have been a death knell. It should have spelled Jayden’s violent death in the Arena.

But, against all expectations, it wasn’t. Jayden had gone into the Arena with Serena at his side, and he’d come out the Victor. Seven children had died at his hands and his blade, but he’d still survived, emerging to the President’s crown on his head and his sister’s congratulations. Nadira Flickerman, the host of the Games, had even pulled Lauren on at the beginning of the Victory Interview to ask Lauren how she felt about Jayden’s win.

“I’m so proud of him for bringing honor to our District,” Lauren had said with a proud smile, and Jayden had noticed how their stylist had used the same fiery red main fabric and geometric black lines to design her gown and Jayden’s suit. He’d noticed how their stylist had drawn the symbolic comparison between them and their wins, between them as siblings and them as Victors.

So now, with the President’s crown on his head, Jayden knows that no one expected him to be here. No one expected Jayden Shiba, despite his District Two honor and skill, to be standing here in a red suit with the golden crown glittering against his brow.

But he did, and he’s here, and that’s all that matters.

-

The boy wrapped in light catches Jayden’s attention at the next Games, and Jayden knows that he is going to be spending too much time staring at this boy- Antonio Garcia of Three, with a wide smile and a sense of charisma that very few Three tributes have ever pulled off.

Antonio’s stylist seems to be riffing off of the “fire” theme that had carried Jayden and Lauren through their Games, but putting enough of a creative spin on it that Antonio shouldn’t suffer any sort of retribution for the symbolism choice. No, instead Antonio is wreathed in glowing lights for the tribute parade, with his District partner wrapped in flickering darkness.

Jayden’s not a Mentor this year- no Two is ever a Mentor the year after their Games- which means that he is completely free to call up Rose to ask her about her tribute.

“Why’d they choose light to represent Antonio?” Jayden asks that night, long after the tributes are set to go to bed.

He can practically hear the smirk in Rose’s voice. “You’ll get to find that out in the Arena,” she says, and  _ touché _ , Jayden guesses.

“Yes ma’am,” he says, as respectful as he can be to any previous Victor. “I’ll watch and pay attention.”

“Glad to hear it, Jayden,” Rose says, something almost fond in her voice.

-

The light almost seems to be foreshadowing. Antonio certainly lights up the Arena- an urban Arena clearly designed to give one of the outliers (specifically Three, Five, Six, or Eight, one of the urban Districts) a better chance of winning after back-to-back wins by Two, the clearest Career District around- with his method of kill, as showy and tech-heavy as any of the few Three winners before him.

In a shatter of light, every lightbulb simultaneously turns on in the building the Careers are camping in before exploding in their faces, killing nearly all of them instantly with shrapnel. Only the girl from Four doesn’t die immediately, and even she bleeds out after crawling a bit away from the initial glass explosion.

All of a sudden, the Games are down five tributes, and Antonio gets christened “the new Apollo” by Nadira Flickerman, who coos over his brains and his ‘style.’

(Well, that’s certainly something Jayden has to give the boy from Three who just destroyed every chance any Career had at winning this year- he’s got style. He has  _ plenty _ of style and charisma, far more than Jayden ever had. He made the audience laugh at his interview, and he just took out the Careers in a  _ very _ flashy way. Jayden isn’t going to make the mistake of ever underestimating Antonio again.)

So Antonio goes on to take out a few more tributes, and within three weeks after he wipes out the Careers he is announced the Victor of the Sixty Eighth Hunger Games after he takes the girl from Five.

-

In the days in between the end of the Games and Antonio’s Victory Interview, Jayden does a little bit of digging as to the results of Antonio’s fate.

Though Twos don’t have to give their bodies over to the Capitol thanks to an age-old deal made with the President of Panem, they learn about the system at a very young age.

Jayden can’t help but breathe a sigh of relief when he learns that Antonio’s tech talents are being used much in the same way that Cam from Six or Rose, Antonio’s own Mentor, are- in that they’re being used to help the Capitol, but not at the expense of the bodies of the Victors who have them.

-

Jayden meets Antonio Garcia of Three at the President’s Ball. Antonio’s in a black suit lined with gold accents, and the wounds he’d sustained from incidental shrapnel are gone from his face and hands, Remade by his prep team. Antonio’s smile is almost too wide to believe from a boy who just killed five Careers and two outliers just last week. “Nice to meet you,  _ amigo _ ,” he says, grin as brilliant as the lights that killed the pack, and Jayden nods back to him.

“Nice to meet you too, Antonio,” he says with a small smile.

“I watched your Games last year,” Antonio says, and Jayden bites back the response that  _ everyone has to watch _ , because he has the feeling that Antonio’s going somewhere with this. “You lit everything up.”

Jayden lets out a small snort. “I didn’t light anything up half as bright as you did.” Because carrying the same fire-and-sword symbolism that his sister did wasn’t anywhere near as fantastic as literally lighting up the Arena with explosions and carrying that light into his parade, pre-Games interview, and Victor’s interview, where his jacket had been subtly glowing.

Antonio’s smile shifts into something approximating a smirk. “That’s to be debated,” he says.

“I’d love to spend the evening discussing it,” Jayden says, and he doesn’t know why he’s being so open with this boy he barely knows, but he can’t help it. For the first time since he entered the Centre at age seven, he feels completely comfortable with someone and willing to open up- an opportunity that he’s not foolish enough to turn down.

“That can definitely be arranged,” Antonio says, and, barring the occasional interruption for one of Antonio’s Sponsors to dance with him, that’s exactly what they do.

-

Jayden finds himself kissing Antonio goodbye that night, a gesture that is enthusiastically reciprocated by the boy from Three. It’s the first time that Jayden’s ever kissed a boy, but he definitely enjoys it.

When they part, Antonio winks. “See you next time?” he asks, and despite his seemingly boundless confidence there is something vulnerable in his voice.

Jayden smiles. “See you next time.”

-

That night Jayden heads back to the apartment he shares with Lauren whenever they’re in town for the Games.

He arrives back first and gets himself a glass of juice from their fridge, then sits down at the kitchen counter (granite, just like back home in Two- he and Lauren had ordered all of the counters specifically that way) to drink. He sits there and, for a few minutes, just thinks about the golden boy from Three, who dropped puns more often than cannons went off during the Bloodbath, who carried the very sun in his smile.

Just five minutes after he arrives back, Lauren enters the apartment, still dressed in the fire-patterned orange gown and poofy jacket that their stylist put her in for the Ball. Her blond curls are pulled up into an elaborate red hairpiece that she pulls down as soon as she enters the door.

Jayden looks at her face as she extricates her hair from the structure. From her half-smile, he knows that she spent the night with Mia, her official assistant and unofficial lover. Most nights she carries that same heavy expression she wore when she won the Games, but tonight seems like it was a good one, spent in her girlfriend’s arms.

And Jayden’s evening, for once, was probably as good as hers.

“How’d the gala go for you?” Lauren asks, sitting the hair structure down on the end of the counter and then sitting down at the table next to him, moving her skirt so that it drapes over the back of the stool. She’s a lot more comfortable than she ever was in the Centre.

They were never very close in the Centre- they were a year apart in classes, so the only opportunity they had to mingle was during lunch, and even then they rarely took it, too dedicated to their studies and schooling. Lauren had her first kill test a year before Jayden did. She bore the weight of murder for a full year before he had to, and it separated them long before the Games ever arrived. She was always one year of experiences older than him, one year of violence and training away from Jayden.

Now, after they’ve both made their way through the Games, after they’ve killed half a dozen children a piece, it finally feels like they have enough in common. They finally understand each other as siblings and as people, finally feel like they can sit here comfortably and know each other well.

(And it only took thirteen kills between them to do so.)

“It went pretty well, thanks,” Jayden answers with a small smile, taking a sip of the apple juice on the counter. It’s a quite a bit more flavorful than the juice they’d served at the Centre, but it still reminds him of home, in a way. “You?”

“I didn’t get up to much,” Lauren says as she slides off her poofy red-and-orange jacket and drapes it carelessly over the back of her chair. By Panem, their stylist’s going to be  _ so _ pissed at her- though, to be honest, Jayden doesn’t think that Lauren cares. “Everyone was far more focused on the fresh Victor…” Her gaze catches on him, and her smile shifts into a teasing one. “Including you, dear brother.”

Jayden thinks of Antonio, of the way he lights up the world, of the first actually  _ fun _ conversation he’s had with anyone in the Capitol, of the way his lips had tasted like fish when they’d kissed. “Well,” Jayden says, “What can I say? Antonio’s got a way of capturing people’s attention.”

Lauren’s eyes grow fond even as she continues to tease. “Oh, so it’s  _ Antonio _ now, not just ‘the Victor from Three?’”

Jayden nods. “He’d kind of have to be, after the amount of time I spent talking to him tonight.”

Lauren’s expression softens. “Well, I know how hard of a time you’ve had making friends,” she says, and he nearly protests. He has  _ plenty  _ of friends...Mia counts, right, even though she’s his sister’s girlfriend? And maybe Serena’s little sister, Emily, who Jayden’s been hanging out with a bit since their Games. And maybe Mike, who was in this year’s crop of candidates but who hadn’t been selected as a Volunteer. Mike’s now entering the Peacekeepers, but he and Jayden keep in touch, talking once every month or so. And of course Lauren herself. That’s a decent amount of friends, right? “And I’m glad that you’ve gotten close to Antonio.”

“I am, too,” Jayden says with a smile, and takes another sip of that glorious apple juice.   
-

In the next few weeks that Antonio is stuck in the Capitol post-Games, Jayden ends up accompanying (or at least meeting up with) Antonio to a number of parties. He introduces him to Sponsors and Capitolites, ones that Lauren and Ji have introduced him to over the past year, and they end up making out in plenty of hallways and bathrooms during and afterwards.

(Through all of this, the President seems to be enjoying the pairing of the Brother of Fire and the Capitol’s Golden Boy, or at least he hasn’t threatened Jayden or Antonio yet for their relationship- or, at least, what approximates a relationship- and Jayden is all too happy to keep it that way, to have Antonio by his side.)

For a good month, Jayden gets to spend time with Antonio, and he finds himself swiftly falling for the brilliant boy from Three, the boy who can create murder with his fingers but who also loves fish and can cook like a dream. The boy who lit up the Capitol and lit up Jayden’s heart, who even manages to impress Lauren one day when they cross paths with her at a random gala.

By Panem, does Jayden want to keep Antonio. He wants to spend as much time as possible with the boy who makes him laugh like they’re not both killers. He wants to kiss Antonio until he forgets everything about his past, until he feels like some ordinary teenage boy instead of one who has spent his entire adolescence training to kill.

-

Then the post-Games month ends, and it’s time for Antonio to return to Three. Jayden’s the last Victor outside of Three’s team to see Antonio, as he’s at the train station when Antonio, Rose, and Andrew Hartford, Three’s other living Victor, are about to step on and leave.

“I’m going to come back and see you again,” Antonio says, smile brilliant as always, “I promise.”

Jayden holds out a hand to Antonio, as if to shake, and Antonio takes it as if to shake it, but Jayden folds their fingers together as if to hold Antonio’s hand. “I’ll hold you to that,” he says, voice not shaking because he’s a Two and they don’t shake, and Antonio’s smile grows (somehow).

“I’ll be glad to let you,” Antonio says, then leans in and kisses Jayden. Antonio’s lips are warm against his, as always, as if Jayden’s not the one with fire in him but instead it’s Antonio, bringing light and warmth wherever he goes.

Then Antonio steps away, breaking their handhold and their kiss, and boards the train with Rose and Andrew.   
And Jayden just smiles softly, then turns and leaves. He’s already looking forward to seeing Antonio again at the Victory Tour, and hopefully he’ll get to spend more time with Antonio after that. Hopefully he’ll be able to visit with Antonio when he’s in the Capitol for tech work.

And if not, well- Jayden is willing to wait for the Games, if that’s what it takes, if that’s the only time of year that he gets to see Antonio. Because Antonio’s worth waiting for.   
-

“So,” Lauren says as he enters the apartment that night, “The Victor of the Sixty Seventh Hunger Games fell in love with the Capitol’s Golden Boy, did he?”

Jayden, who can still feel Antonio’s lips on his, raises his eyebrow at his sister. “I wouldn’t call it  _ love _ ,” he says, because he’s realistic. A few dates over the course of a month don’t a love make.

“Fine,” she says, smile half-teasing, half-serious. “You fell in  _ like _ with the boy from Three.”

Now,  _ that _ his brain has no trouble processing. “Yes, I suppose I did,” Jayden he says, because Two Victors aren’t supposed to fall for people from other Districts, but Antonio’s a Victor so he supposes that admitting  _ like _ isn’t too bad.

“Good for you, little brother,” Lauren says, and he takes in the fact that for once she isn’t dressed in their stylist’s extravagant fire-inspired gowns and jackets, but instead something simpler, much more like District Two than the Capitol. A pair of blue shorts with black tights and a white tank top under a blue vest, a pink scarf hanging around her neck.

“That’s Mia’s, isn’t it?” Jayden asks, gesturing to her scarf, and Lauren’s cheeks actually go a bit pink, despite the fact that she and Mia have been dating since at least her Victory Tour a year and a half ago.

“Yes, it is,” Lauren says somewhat stiffly, but her quiet smile is fond so he knows that he hasn’t made her uncomfortable.

“You love her, don’t you?” he asks, because one month might not have been long enough to fall in love with someone but a year and a half definitely is.

The corners of her eyes crease as she smiles, genuine happiness shining through. “Yes, I do. Despite it all.”

She doesn’t have to explain what “it all” is, and he doesn’t expect her to. The Games rarely need to be mentioned here in their apartment, where both of them survived them despite the odds and don’t need a reminder of what they did to make it out of the Arena.

No one expected both of them to make it out, but Jayden is so happy that they did. He’s so happy that he has his sister by his side as he falls in  _ like _ with Antonio and she is in love with Mia, that the years of distance did not breed resentment and that they can be comfortable with each other now.

So Jayden smiles right back at her. “I really hope that works out, then,” he says, and she nods.

“Same to you, little brother.”

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you guys liked this first entry- it's going to be quite the journey through world-building, the Arenas, the rebellion, and everything else this is going to bring.
> 
> Victors introduced in this fic:  
> 32nd Games: Ji, District 2  
> 67th Games: Lauren Shiba, District 2  
> 68th Games: Jayden Shiba, District 2  
> 69th Games: Antonio Garcia, District 3
> 
> Tributes who died in the Games:  
> 68th Games: Serena, District 2

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [i’d suffer through hell if you’d tell me](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20032936) by [sapphfics](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sapphfics/pseuds/sapphfics)




End file.
